


it's warmest right beside you

by emily_420



Category: Gintama
Genre: Other, tiny manga spoilers?, ultimate brofluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-16
Updated: 2015-02-16
Packaged: 2018-03-13 08:06:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3374027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emily_420/pseuds/emily_420
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kondou asks Katsura if he wants to come over for a nap.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it's warmest right beside you

It’s the early hours of a sunny Sunday afternoon, the air a bit thick and the sun unrelenting, when Kondou calls up Katsura. He shopping for the night’s dinner when he gets the call, and is forced to abandon the basket with Elizabeth – who flashes a sign that says, ‘Leave it to me, Katsura-san’ – so that he can take the call outside, because he’s a firm believer in not causing other people trouble.

“Yes?” he answers, a bit huffy, wondering what could be needed of him at such a time.

“It’s me,” comes Kondou’s rough voice. Katsura’s bad mood deflates a tiny bit, but not by enough for him to hold his tongue.

“What do you want?” Katsura asks, accidentally slipping into his most motherish tone of voice. “I’ll have you know that I was doing my shopping in the middle of a crowded store and–”

“Katsura,” Kondou cuts his rant off tiredly, “I was just wondering – do you want to come over and nap with me?”

 _Nap?_ Katsura thinks in astonishment. “Nap?” he echoes aloud. Definitely not what he’d expected. It sounded like something Gintoki might say, if he were more sociable about things that didn’t involve getting drunk. “You know you shouldn’t sleep during the say,” Katsura says instead of any number of other thoughts. “You won’t be able to sleep tonight. And it’s that kind of laziness unbefitting of a samurai that leads to your physical condition deteriorating. Oh, I know,” Katsura’s voice takes a lighter turn to it, “you don’t think it’ll happen to you, but setting a precedent is the first step.”

“Are you done?” Kondou asks now that he can get a word in; from the sound of him, he might be rubbing his face tiredly. “Do you want to nap or not?”

Katsura considers that his afternoon is full of unimportant things, that he can see Elizabeth coming out of the store with a bag of groceries, and that Kondou is newest and most strangely formed of Katsura’s close friendships. “...Sure,” he says.

.

Any odd looks or secretive whispering that once broke out in the Shinsengumi when Katsura was around as an ally has long since ended. These days – peaceful days – he is greeted as he enters the compound with bows and, here and there, salutes. Katsura is friendly yet brief with them, making his way down the familiar route to Kondou’s room. Kondou is sitting outside in the sun, leaning back on his hands, his eyes closed.

“Oh, my,” Katsura remarks, standing in from of Kondou and casting his shadow over his friend’s face, “did you fall asleep already?”

Kondous eyes crack open and he slumps forward slightly. “No, I’m good...” he says, dragging a hand over his weary face.

“You don’t look good,” Katsura says bluntly, peering intently at him.

“Hey, that’s awful,” Kondou grins crookedly, the beginnings of a laugh in his voice. “I thought we had something going here.”

His tone kinder, softer, Katsura says, “You know what I mean. Is everything okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah,” Kondou heaves himself up, wobbling a little. “I just need some rest.”

.

They’re lying side by side in Kondou’s futon like it’s the most natural thing in the world, only even with his eyes shut Katsura can tell that he’s being watched.

He opens his eyes. Kondou is leaning on his elbow, looking down at him. “What.” Katsura asks flatly.

Kondou looks away, eyes something across the room. “Nothing.”

Katsura lifts his left hand, the one nearest Kondou, and uses it to gently turn his friend’s gaze back toward him. Looking intently into Kondou’s eyes, the other watching him guardedly, Katsura asks, “What are you thinking about?”

The guard Kondou had up dissolves easily, as if melted away by Katsura’s touch. “Just that... it should be weird, right? Doing stuff like this with someone who was my enemy for ages. If you’d told me before everything happened, I wouldn’t have believed it. But right now, it feels like the most normal thing for me – like it should have been like this all along. ...Is that weird?”

Katsura rolls that through his mind briefly, says, “Not at all.” Turning his gaze to the ceiling, he concentrates on the feel of Kondou’s bulky warmth beside him. “I feel exactly the same way.”

**Author's Note:**

> based on my own damn tags on [this post](http://bansigh.tumblr.com/post/111169745615/ideal-relationship-goals)
> 
> i wrote thisw at 1am and im still not sure why i used present tense. in any case i wasnt planning on writing any konzura until the current arc is over but here we are
> 
> anyway katsura is an nb angel but idk if i should use different pronouns for him bc they/their doesnt quite feel right. please love konzura but especially Ace Non-binary Mother Katsura Kotarou
> 
> EDIT: i realised while i was on the train that i marked this as m/m & then talked about nb zura at the end... do you ever hate urself


End file.
